Why Soccer Matters

by Pelé

  Still, there was promise. You had to search for it, sure, but it was there. For one thing, the history of U.S. soccer was not quite as barren as most people thought. During the 1950 World Cup, Uruguay beating Brazil at the Maracanã wasn’t even the biggest upset of the tournament. The United States shocked England, the birthplace of modern soccer, by a score of 1–0 before a crowd of some ten thousand people in Belo Horizonte, Brazil. The winning goal was scored by Joe Gaetjens, a Haitian-born man who was working in the United States at the time, and was allowed to play for the national team because he had expressed his intent to become a U.S. citizen. (He never actually did.) The result was such a shock that, when The New York Times received a wire-service account of the final score, they didn’t immediately publish it, thinking it was a hoax. Writing about the game fifty years later, the Times said it remained “one of the sport’s greatest upsets.”

  Four decades would pass until the Americans again attained similar success at the World Cup. But, in the meantime, other interesting things were also happening. At the college level, the game was gaining some converts. Thanks in part to the social changes happening in the United States in the 1960s and 1970s, girls and women were beginning to embrace soccer, to a much greater extent than in Europe or South America. Also important, there was a group of very powerful people in business and media who were starting to take a keen interest in soccer as well.

  One of them was Steve Ross. Steve was the chairman of Warner Communications, and a man who spent his entire life taking big risks and innovating. His empire included Atlantic Records, with artists such as Led Zeppelin and Crosby, Stills and Nash; Hollywood studios with talent such as Steven Spielberg and Robert Redford; and even a company, Atari, that made these new things called “video games.” Ross first took an interest in soccer through the Ertegun brothers, who ran Atlantic. Before long, Steve became obsessed with the idea of making soccer popular in the United States.

  Why? Of all the “toys” that Steve had at his disposal, with all the access to celebrities and music and the arts, why would soccer, of all things, become the object of his affection? Years later, Steve explained it to me. He said he used to have the same prejudices against the game as most Americans: It was too slow, too “foreign,” too difficult to understand what was really going on. But once he started watching the game, and had some friends explain it to him, he realized how fascinating soccer could be. He believed that it just needed the right conditions to thrive. In other words, he saw soccer like an entrepreneur, which of course was exactly what he was, and an excellent one at that. He spotted an unmet need, an undervalued asset, and made it his personal mission to make it succeed, come hell or high water.

  After the Cosmos struggled through its first few seasons, switching stadiums every so often and failing to generate much buzz, Steve purchased the team from its original investors for the grand price of one dollar. And then, for no good reason other than his own passion and drive, Steve decided to throw the entire commercial and marketing weight of Warner Communications behind the team. He would not only make the Cosmos a winner, but bring a “new” spectator sport to the American public.

  Steve Ross and his staff believed in soccer. They knew the game itself was a winner. They just believed that, in order to make it popular, they needed to improve the quality of play. To make that happen, they believed they needed a name-brand star. And they had heard of some guy down in Brazil who was apparently pretty good.

  7

  The idea didn’t appeal much to me at first.

  Well, let’s be honest: It was absurd!

  The Cosmos’ general manager, a former British sportswriter named Clive Toye, started trying to recruit me as far back as 1971, the year after the World Cup in Mexico. I was still with Santos at the time, and Clive came to the team hotel while we were playing a game in Jamaica. He tracked me down by the pool, where I was sitting in a lounge chair with Professor Mazzei.

  “We want you to bring soccer to America,” Clive said, practically too nervous to breathe. “We think you’re just the man to do it. Money’s no object.”

  Clive outlined some basic terms of the offer. He sat there talking while Professor Mazzei translated. I have to admit, during that first visit, I was only half listening. I wasn’t trying to be rude, but you have to understand—I had been receiving offers to play outside Brazil for more than a decade by that point. Many of the best teams of Europe, including AC Milan and Real Madrid, had made fevered overtures over the years. I was flattered, of course, but every time speculation about my departure heated up, the Brazilian press would go absolutely crazy.

  This was before the era when the best South American players made a habit of playing in Europe—all eleven of the starters on the 1970 national team played for Brazilian clubs, believe it or not. So many commentators accused me of being an opportunist or even a national traitor, in tune with the “Brazil: Love It or Leave It” philosophy that characterized Brazil during those dictatorship years. The media weren’t the only ones who got excited—at one point, the Brazilian government even declared me a “national treasure,” which some people said would prevent me from leaving Brazil to play abroad.

  The funny thing was, I had never seriously entertained the notion of playing soccer outside Brazil. I had my reasons: In a nutshell, I really loved my mom’s arroz e feijão, her homemade rice and beans. I guess that’s a Brazilian way of saying that I’m very happy and comfortable at home, and I always have been. Without leaving Santos, I could play for what was, for many years, the world’s best soccer club. I had my mom and dad in a house just a few blocks away from our apartment. Rose and the kids were very happy in Santos. It was always eighty degrees, and a glorious beach was right there for the taking. Playing for the Brazilian national team, and for Santos on our frequent trips abroad, gave me plenty of opportunities to measure my abilities against quality opponents in Europe and elsewhere. So, sure, why on earth would I ever leave?

  Even if I did get the urge to wander, and play soccer elsewhere, the United States hardly seemed like the first place I’d go. Don’t get me wrong—I loved the country itself. I loved the freedom: the freedom to raise your family in peace, the freedom to do business and make money, the freedom to walk around without fearing for your safety. It was a place where you could pursue your own dreams without anybody—the government, the business elite—standing in your way. This may sound very basic to Americans, but for a Brazilian, and for people from many other countries, it was an amazing revelation. I remember visiting Los Angeles with Rose during the late 1960s, and we went down to Hollywood Boulevard. As we walked around, I became intoxicated by how prosperous and peaceful everything seemed. Being able to walk down a street without being overwhelmed by people was a plus, too. I swept Rose into my arms, lifted her high into the air and began shouting: “I’m free! I’m free!”

  But American soccer? It seemed like a nut that couldn’t be cracked. The Cosmos seemed to have more in common with an amateur team than the high-level competition I was accustomed to in Brazil or in Europe. And despite all of Clive’s promises, I was skeptical of the very American-seeming notion that whatever you didn’t have, you could buy. How would bringing me to the United States magically create interest in a country that already had four top-rate professional sports leagues? It seemed ridiculous.

  I, too, was underestimating the power of soccer.

  8

  Clive Toye kept after me for years, obsessively, like some kind of crazy hunter—I was Moby-Dick to his Captain Ahab. He even made the Cosmos’ team colors yellow and green, the same colors that the Brazilian national team used, thinking that this might help seduce me. No matter how many times I politely told him no, or how clearly I said I would never ever ever leave Brazil, he would always show up again, lurking in a hotel lobby or making his way to the sidelines of my games. Each time, he acted as if the conversation was the first we’d ever had. “We have this great team we’re
putting together in New York,” he’d begin, just as earnestly as the first time we talked. “We think you should come play with us for three years.”

  I’d smile, and listen, but I also didn’t want to give him false hopes. “Thank you, but I’m very happy in Brazil,” I’d say. “And in 1974, I will retire from Santos and from soccer.”

  That’s precisely what I did, of course. Even then, Clive kept asking. And I kept turning him down—until I started to think, hmm, maybe playing in New York City wasn’t such a crazy idea after all.

  I won’t try to disguise this: A big reason for my change of heart was the ill-fated visit from the accountant in late 1974. I owed millions, I was determined to pay the debt, and I knew that playing soccer was by far the best way for me to do so. The sums that Clive was mentioning amounted to the most lucrative sports contract in history, in any sport. But there were other reasons, too, that had absolutely nothing to do with money.

  One of Clive’s best lines had to do with the unique opportunity of bringing soccer to the United States. “Play for Real Madrid and you might win a championship,” he would say. “Play for New York, and you’ll win a country.” This overture resonated with me a lot, actually—the Cosmos were offering an opportunity to not just play soccer, but to change its whole culture in one of the world’s greatest and most important countries.

  This was important, and not just for the United States, I believed. Finally getting Americans on board with soccer would have a positive effect everywhere. After all, the U.S. was home not only to millions of wealthy fans, but also to Hollywood and most of the world’s biggest companies. Through my sponsorships with Pepsi and other companies, I had seen firsthand how U.S. corporate money could be used to do good in the world, by funding soccer clinics and building facilities in poor neighborhoods, for example. During those years, I also saw how companies were more and more interested in developing markets and opportunities beyond their home territory. It was clear that this was a tremendous force. If we could get the American people interested in soccer, then American companies would follow. That, in turn, would be good for soccer players in Brazil as well as countless other countries. This was all a huge challenge, but I knew that if I succeeded, it would be something I could be proud of forever.

  The possibility of living in the United States also appealed greatly to my newest passion: education. Our kids were still young enough to learn fluent English, which I knew would serve them well for the rest of their lives. Rose said she was excited about the possibility of residing in another country, and exploring a world beyond Santos. I also knew that living in the world’s richest country would teach me a few lessons about how business works. Who knew? Maybe I’d finally acquire the ability to earn millions of dollars without promptly losing them.

  Another plus: a small degree of anonymity. I had played a few exhibition games with Santos in the United States as part of our global tours, and there were quite a lot of people who recognized me there. I’d even been named an honorary citizen of Kansas City after Santos played there in the early seventies! But it wasn’t like elsewhere in the world, where seemingly everyone knew exactly who I was, usually from a hundred yards away. In America, even some “soccer people” often mispronounced my name, calling me “Peel.” I wouldn’t have wanted to go somewhere where I was completely unknown—that would have defeated the purpose—but the United States seemed to offer a happy medium between anonymity and the usual crush of fans. After all, the United States already had so many famous people in movies and sports. And if the idea of moving to New York City to get some peace and quiet sounds odd . . . well, anybody who followed my life for the previous twenty years would have understood.

  Finally, sometimes the little experiences that happen to us in life, and the people we come across, can have a huge effect on our decisions. One morning in Brussels, Belgium, Clive showed up—lurking, smiling, in a good mood, as always—at my hotel. I had retired from Santos by this time, and had played the night before in a charity game for the retiring Belgian captain, the great Paul Van Himst. Clive invited himself into my room, and kept having to start his pitch over as a procession of international soccer superstars—guys like Rivelino of Brazil and Eusebio of Portugal—barged in to hug me good-bye.

  “Come on, Pelé, just three years,” Clive was pleading.

  By that point, I had some interest in what this man was saying. But I remember that particular day I was in a hurry to leave Belgium and get back to my family in Brazil. Such a hurry, in fact, that as I leaned down to pick up my suitcase, I tore a giant hole in the seat of my pants!

  I called downstairs to the lobby and asked if they had anybody who could quickly sew the hole closed. They sent up a maid, who collected the pants and disappeared. Clive was still making his case when, a few minutes later, there was a knock on the door.

  It was the maid again. She held the pants in one hand, and a camera in the other. Tears were streaming down her cheeks.

  She stepped into the room, shaking, and handed the camera to Clive. “Please, sir,” she whispered hoarsely, “would you take a picture of me with Pelé?”

  The maid—whose name, I’m ashamed to say, I don’t recall—told me that her husband had bought a ticket to the previous night’s game. He had been hoping to see me play for the first time. Two weeks before the game, sadly, he died of a heart attack. So her son used the ticket, and went to the game instead. The maid wanted a photo of me so she could give it to her son as a kind of memorial.

  Halfway through her story, I was already crying. By the time she finished, I was shuddering with sobs. The story was tragic, and I felt profound sympathy for this woman and her son. Also, her story reminded me of the profound connections I’d forged with so many people over the years as a soccer player. I had been retired for a few months by this point, but that old feeling washed over me: warm, sentimental, alive. It reminded me of my true place in this world. And I realized that, for all my misgivings over the years about fame, I desperately missed the most basic and rewarding part of being an athlete—the bond with my fans. It wasn’t too late to try to recapture it.

  After the maid finished telling the story, and Clive took several pictures of her and me together, I kissed her good-bye and she left the room. Then I turned to Clive.

  “OK,” I said. “I’ll play for the Cosmos.”

  Clive’s eyes lit up like a child on Christmas morning. “Really?”

  I nodded, smiling.

  He started running around the room—frantic, in jerks and stops, totally unsure how to react. It was as if he’d never considered the possibility I might say yes! What to do now? I really liked Clive by this point, so I told him to just relax and do what he needed to do.

  Finally, he had me sign a little piece of hotel stationery, expressing my intent to play for the team. It wasn’t quite that simple, of course—we’d need to negotiate a real contract, with agents and intermediaries and all those things. But the signed sheet of paper was a start. Many years later, Clive still had it hanging in a frame in his office—G.B. MOTOR INN, BRUSSELS, the letterhead read.

  Imagine: Me, a poor kid from Brazil, talked out of retirement by a British man working for an American soccer club—with a Belgian woman delivering the coup de grâce! This was no longer the world as I had first seen it, as a starry-eyed teenager in Sweden in 1958. All of a sudden, everything seemed to be more connected—money and people were flowing around the globe in search of one another. Today, they call this “globalization,” and although we didn’t have a snappy name for it in the mid-1970s, it was changing the way people made decisions and interacted with one another. Basically, it meant that if Steve Ross and Warner Communications wanted to do whatever it took to get a famous Brazilian soccer player to play for their little team in New York, nothing was going to get in their way.

  In retrospect, I didn’t stand a chance!

  9

  For the press conferen
ce to announce my arrival, the Cosmos rented out the 21 Club, a glamorous nightclub frequented by celebrities in Manhattan. Some three hundred members of the media (and more than a few curious spectators) showed up—double the club’s capacity, and almost as many people as had attended some of the club’s games. I was a little late, unfortunately, and as the crowd grew tense, a fistfight broke out among the reporters. A Brazilian cameraman had his glasses broken. The police briefly threatened to call the whole thing off.

  Why was it so chaotic? Well, it was New York City in the 1970s! It was a time of soaring crime and blackouts and open-air drug use and gritty streets, back when Times Square was a hotbed of adult cinemas instead of the glowing neon retail theme park of today. It was an era before security became king, before economic growth “cured” many ills, when it seemed like chaos was lurking behind every corner. It was, in other words, a lot like Brazil! I was going to feel right at home.

  Despite all the buzz, my transfer almost didn’t happen. Getting from the little sheet of paper in the Belgian hotel to the 21 Club was an odyssey that involved numerous late-night negotiations, transcontinental flights and miles of telex tape (a since-forgotten system of rapid communication, technologically somewhere between the telegraph and texting). Delegates from Warner Communications, representing Steve Ross, came to Brazil and at one point we played soccer for a few hours on the beach in Rio as we tried to iron out the details.